My boyfriend can’t handle my past! How to deal with this effectively
Unfortunately, not many of us enter our lifelong romantic relationship without some sort of past. It is inevitable that eventually an argument will break out in which both you and the man you love will confess the deepest, darkest secrets of your past relationship. Although other entanglements occurred before the two of you met, they can still cause a lot of conflict in the present. Such is the case of a man who can’t seem to get over the reality that his girlfriend had boyfriends before him. If your man can’t handle the fact that you have a past, you face an uphill battle. Once you confess your past sins to him, obviously you cannot take them back. However, there are things you can do to undo the damage you’ve already done and make him see beyond what you did before you met him. Getting your man to focus on the here and now is really the key to making it happen.
Make sure he knows how you feel about him is different
It is impossible to know how much is too much to tell about your past. In most relationships, we strive for full disclosure. We want the connection to be based on honesty, and that includes openness about any relationships that may have been meaningful in the past.
However, you can never know for sure how your man will react to the news that you were involved with other men before him. Some guys take the information in stride and never think twice about it, others allow the details to fester in their emotional center and it quickly becomes a source of endless conflict between the couple.
You can usually tell if your man is upset by the news that he has, in fact, had a past before him. He will ask you countless questions about your former lovers and may even ask you to compare him to them. If this happens, you need to make it very clear to your boyfriend that he is the only man you have ever felt this close to. You want to make sure to express to him that you think the connection you share is greater than anything you’ve had in the past. Make sure your boyfriend understands that you feel like any experience you had before you met him was just to fill your time until he came into your life. Make sure he feels very special.
Encourage him to focus on the present and the future
If your boyfriend repeatedly wants to talk about your past relationships, change the conversation to what you want to do with him now and tomorrow. Some men become so obsessed with their girlfriend’s past that they can’t enjoy what’s going on between them right now. You have to be the one to guide your man to this enlightenment and you can do this by creating new experiences for both of you. Every time you tell your boyfriend, “I’ve never done that before,” he’ll feel like he’s embarking on a new adventure that you’ll only share with him. It doesn’t matter if it’s rock climbing or trying a new restaurant. The focus should be on creating new memories that only involve the two of you.
It’s also wise to gently tell him that you can’t change your past and that you need to put it to rest so it doesn’t create a huge divide between the two of you. He may feel unable or unwilling to do this, but it’s important to emphasize to him that unless he does, the relationship can’t move forward.
Realize that your insecurities are driving your behavior
When a man asks a woman about her past, he usually does so with the expectation that he will be able to handle whatever she shares. If the information goes beyond the scope of what he expected to hear, she can push some buttons of vulnerability within her ego.
Even if your other experiences were many years ago, your man may take them as a personal challenge. He may wonder what you saw in other men and also have the unrealistic idea that you should have expected someone like him, or him, in particular.
If he asked you about your past and you shared what you felt was appropriate in an honest and compassionate way, you won’t be able to control his reaction. You are not responsible for his injured or threatened ego. You can’t carry the guilt that your confession changed the relationship. If your connection fails because of your honesty, that’s a clear indicator that your man’s ego matters more to you than the honesty between the two of you.
There may come a point where you have to decide if you want to continue to defend your past choices while trying to build a new and meaningful connection with a man who seems stuck in your past. It’s important to remember that no matter how much he wants you to be able to change your past, you can’t. If he can’t accept the woman you are now, even who you were in the past, that may be a sticking point the two of you can’t get past.